'True meaning of civic virtue' honored

Published 7:00 pm, Wednesday, October 17, 2007

Surely there was a better use for about three acres of utility easement along Hope Village Road than just as a place for weeds to grow. So Kolchiss, one of the original homebuyers in Heritage Park Village, decided to go to her Homeowners Association about it.

By TOM JACOBS, tjacobs@hcnonline.com

Then she went back again. And again. And again. And a few more times after that. Pretty soon, she was more a fixture at HOA board meetings than anyone else.

And so the HOA fulfilled Kolchiss' wish and transformed the field into what became informally known as Triangle Park (from its shape), with a playground set and a walking path and landscaping. Finally, before Kolchiss' death at age 74 in September 2004, the HOA decided that the only name suitable for the park was that of the lady who fought so hard for it.

In the Saturday sunshine, Irene Kolchiss Park was formally named, with a brass plaque giving the particulars literally set in stone along the walking path. In attendance were her three children - daughters Kathy Grugel and JoAnne Bergen from Florida and son Tom Kolchiss from California, former Heritage Park neighbors who remember her determination to see the park through, and old friends from Pasadena where Kolchiss is remembered for her friendship.

"My mom would have appreciated this," said JoAnne Bergen. "She always loved a good party."

And it is fitting that a rock, even one that had to be trucked in to the park, symbolize the park's first patron.

"I was guided to that rock," Hoyt quipped to Kolchiss' children. "Your mom told me which rock to get. She just didn't tell me that it was going to weigh 800 pounds."

Kolchiss and husband Joe first came to Pasadena in the 1970s, where he worked in the oil and gas industry. Pasadena friend Sylvia Lovell remembered Kolchiss as a gracious lady active in the Pasadena Community Club and civic affairs.

"She loved to have friends over for tea," Lovell said.

The couple moved to Heritage Park Village when home construction started there in the 1980s. She immediately plunged into whatever could make her neighborhood a better place. Even when her husband passed away a decade ago, she kept at it.

"It was more of what she wasn't involved in," Hoyt remembered. "She was so active in our community. She was at every election with the League of Women Voters."

"She was an advocate for kids, she was an advocate for voting, she was an advocate for anything that was good," Hoyt added.

On Saturday, the rock that bears the dedication plaque was surrounded by a number of small American flags. "Irene used to put these out in her yard every holiday," Hoyt said. After she died, her daughters were sorting through her belongings and asked Hoyt if he wanted anything.

"I asked them for those flags," he said. "I'm going to put them out now." At the end of Saturday's dedication, he presented each of his beloved neighbor's children with one of the miniature Old Glories.

A park for kids and good friends. Irene Kolchiss would be proud of her legacy.